prettycurefandomcom-20200223-history
User blog:GlitterInformer/Doki Doki! Pretty Cure/Glitter Force Doki Doki SDC: Episode 42 (Sub)
Episode 41 (Sub) | Table of Contents | Episode 43 (Sub), 25 (Dub) Japanese title: “Let’s All Celebrate Together! My First Birthday!” Including this episode, we only have 8 episodes left to go of Doki Doki! Pretty Cure. Despite this, we don’t know all that much about Aguri. Why does she have amnesia? How did she meet Ai and become a Pretty Cure? Why is she even more determined than any of the other girls to defeat King Jikochuu, as shown by her aging up after transforming? In the dub, how does she know she comes from Splendorius? And why does she seem to have a connection with the princess? From what I’ve read on the wiki, this episode and next episode (mostly next episode) will get into Aguri’s backstory. Even though this episode is going to focus on something as mundane as a birthday party, it seems like we’ll be getting more of a backstory for our main characters! The episode starts with a flashback to the final battle of the Trump Kingdom, where Princess Ange is talking directly to King Jikochuu himself. Her mouth, by the way, is a bit too big for her face. Hopefully, we won’t be getting animation slip-ups like this throughout the episode. DDPC42 01 queen marie ange.png The princess asks why King Jikochuu wants to destroy the Trump Kingdom when it’s filled with peaceful, innocent people. King Jikochuu says that the Trump Kingdom denizens’ love for each other won’t last forever… Dude, you’re an idiot. Their smiles will disappear someday, so you’re erasing their smiles right now? Why are you even going about this plan if the smiles will just disappear on their own someday? That’s like killing somebody because they’re going to die anyway. Not because the person is annoying or has hurt you, but just because they’re going to die. Essentially, the Trump Kingdom is being destroyed because the Trump Kingdom is going to be destroyed. This is so stupid. Granted, King Jikochuu isn’t the only Pretty Cure villain who has this flawed logic. If you’re creating a villain who wants to destroy the entire universe, it’s hard to give that villain proper motivation. But the writers could at least try. What if, since King Jikochuu is the king of selfishness itself, he wanted all of the universe for himself so he could mold it in his image? He’d be evil, but he wouldn’t be downright moronic anymore. Rather than pointing out how much of an idiot King Jikochuu is being, Princess Ange just insists that what King Jikochuu’s saying isn’t true. And that isn’t correct, either. Sure, King Jikochuu’s reasons for wanting to destroy the universe are stupid and his logic is invalid. However, the claim he’s making, that love won’t last forever, is true. Whether it’s via heat death or some other method, the universe and all life in it will eventually end. Rather than insisting that humanity will live on forever when it clearly won’t, the princess should instead be pointing out the holes in King Jikochuu’s logic instead of saying that his initial claim is false. Oh yeah, and we finally find out the princess’s full name: Princess Marie Ange. This explains why her dub counterpart is named Princess Marie Angelica instead of just Princess Angelica. Anyway, it turns out that this whole flashback is a dream that Aguri wakes up from. She isn’t sure why she had this dream, but it’s left her feeling quite sad. She even has tears in her eyes after snapping awake. We get the opening theme and the title card. Then, we cut to Mana’s restaurant-house, where the girls (sans Aguri) are reading their horoscopes in a magazine. We then find out the four girls’ celestial signs! · Mana’s birthday is August 4th, making her a Leo. · Makoto’s birthday is November 4th, making her a Scorpio. (It seems that the Trump Kingdom uses the same calendar as most people on Earth do.) · We unfortunately don’t get Rikka and Arisu’s birthdays, but Rikka is a Virgo and Arisu is a Gemini. According to Makoto and Dabi, there are also horoscopes in the Trump Kingdom. By the way, it seems like the beginning scene wasn’t the only one with weird faces. A lot of the faces in this scene, too, look wrong. Nowhere near the level of [https://prettycure.fandom.com/wiki/File:13_10_fisheye_2.png Miyuki Hoshizora’s face from episode 13 of Smile Pretty Cure!], but it’s still clear that the animators took a bit of a breather on this episode. Mana’s mom then comes home and the fairies hide under the table. The girls tell her that they’ve been looking at their horoscopes and Mana asks Aguri what her sign is. It turns out that Aguri doesn’t know when her birthday is. Aguri’s pretty cheerful about it, though. As long as she someday gets invited to a birthday party and gets to eat delicious cake, she says she’s perfectly fine. Aguri then leaves. Though Ai happily wishes her farewell, the other girls are pretty concerned about their 10-year-old teammate. Once Aguri’s gone, Mana’s mom says that she needs to have a talk with Mana. It turns out that, unbeknownst to Mana, Aguri is adopted. I thought it had already been revealed that Aguri was adopted, but looking back at my article on episode 27->21, it turns out it was only ever said she was adopted in the dub. So, even though Maya should know by now that Natalie is adopted, the same doesn’t go for Mana. This may have become a bit of a plot hole if this episode was dubbed. So, it turns out that Mana may have accidentally offended Aguri. Fortunately, this whole adoption thing won’t be a big reveal for Aguri herself, as she’s already known for a long time that she’s adopted. Mana’s mom tells Mana to treat Aguri as she always has. Mana feels bad for having talked to Aguri about such a sensitive subject, but Rikka and Arisu say that it’s okay because Mana didn’t know any better. Raquel and Sharuru are annoyed that Aguri never told them that she was adopted, and Makoto says that there are some things so important that people want to keep them to themselves. Makoto then reveals, much to the surprise of the other three, that she’s also an orphan. She never got to know her parents because apparently, they died in an accident. However, she had a lot of other foster kids to play with, as well as being visited quite often by Princess Ange herself. DDPC42 02 makoto.png|Makoto, is your face okay? Interestingly, it turns out that as a kid, Makoto had the same hair and eye color she does as Cure Sword. This implies that her default form is Cure Sword. So, instead of a normal civilian transforming into a Pretty Cure, Cure Sword seems to be a Pretty Cure transforming into a normal civilian! This is really cool, and I think Sword is the only Pretty Cure whose true form is her Cure form. DDPC42 03 young cure sword.png|happy gorl Another interesting thing is that other than the princess, Sword is the only person who seems to have a strange hair color. Everyone else has either brown or blond hair. Perhaps this means that Sword is the only Pretty Cure out of the group. So, was she born a Pretty Cure, or was she chosen somehow? Where did her Pretty Cure uniform come from if we see her wearing common clothes while in Cure form? Do the other kids have names like “Sword”? Did Sword have the ability to perform magical attacks, even as a little kid? Anyway, the others are in tears upon hearing Makoto’s story. Sharuru takes it the worst and asks why Makoto never told her this earlier. Makoto gives her a hug and says that she just didn’t want to worry anyone. In typical Mana fashion, Mana suddenly bursts out of her sadness with a surge of cheerfulness and gets the idea to throw Aguri a party. I’m not sure what this has to do with Makoto, but okay. Rikka and Arisu point out that they don’t know when Aguri’s birthday is, and Mana says that means they can celebrate her birthday any time. Mana decides all by herself that they’ll hold it tomorrow and tells everybody to bring a present but not to let Aguri know what they’re planning. We cut to the Trump Kingdom, where Regina is a lot less energetic than usual. She’s still thinking about what Cure Sword and Cure Rosetta said to her in the last two episodes about there still being love in her heart. Thinking about that makes her exhausted. Ira wonders why Regina’s out of sorts. He thinks she might have a cold but then says that idiots don’t catch colds. Marmo then comes in and tells Ira to watch his words or he won’t be popular with the ladies. While she says this, she eats a pudding à la mode she found in the fridge. This is what gets Regina up and running again, as the pudding was hers first. Marmo gives a fake apology and downs the rest of the pudding. In retaliation, Regina electrocutes Marmo. Ira thinks she’s overreacting, but Regina says that sweets are serious business because they bring smiles to a girl’s face. She then heads off to the human world to steal everyone’s sweets and drags an unwilling Ira along with her. That night, Aguri has the same dream she did last night. Her grandmother notices that she’s up in the middle of the night and assumes she can’t sleep, so she makes some hot milk for her. Aguri admits that she’s been having trouble sleeping lately and has been having the same dream over and over. Her grandma says that she’s also been having a recurring dream: one about Aguri being grown up and wearing a white dress and lots of makeup. She thinks it’s Aguri wearing a wedding dress, but Aguri realizes that her grandma is somehow dreaming about her being Cure Ace. Before I go any further, I should state that Aguri’s grandmother is named Mari Madoka. That should save some typing from here on out. Aguri suddenly burst into tears and cries into Mari’s lap. She says that she’ll never leave Mari, but Mari knows that someday, she’ll change her mind, and that she was destined to leave her someday since the day she was born. Mari then sends Aguri back to bed. But before she goes, Aguri asks if she can sleep with Mari, and Mari agrees. SWEET HOME ALABAMA Just kidding. It’s not like that. Anyway, we get the eyecatches. Then, we cut to the supermarket, where Makoto and DB are shopping for ingredients for Aguri’s birthday cake. Aguri then walks by. Makoto, who happens to be wearing a long coat, a hat, and glasses, insists that she isn’t Makoto Kenzaki. Then, she and DB run off. Aguri’s confused. It’s unclear whether Aguri recognized Makoto and DB or not, but if she didn’t, she’s an idiot. Even if we buy Makoto’s “disguise”, DB looked just as she usually does while in human form, and there aren’t any other purple-haired people than Makoto and DB. As Aguri is walking home from the supermarket, she catches Mana and Rikka buying flowers. When Aguri asks what they’re talking about and if she can help, the two insist they’re in a hurry and rush off. They almost have a convincing lie, but then they nervously laugh while running off, which cements their suspiciousness. Aguri is simply more confused. Back at Aguri’s house, Arisu and Sebastian are helping set up the party with Mari, and Arisu asks Mari to keep it a secret from Aguri. Just then, Aguri walks in and asks what they’re talking about. We actually see Arisu emote beyond her characteristic calmness for a change, which is pretty funny. DDPC42 04 arisu.png Arisu can’t come up with an alibi, so she asks Sebastian to come up with one for her. Unfortunately, the lie is extremely nonsensical. Sebastian says that Arisu wanted to eat pancakes but ran out of honey, so she came to Mari to get some. He then repeats “no honey” (“hachimitsu nai”) over and over, shortens it to “mitsunai”, and then says, “Naimitsu!” (“Secrecy!”) If this episode were dubbed, Saban would have had to change Sebastian’s entire alibi, as not even the subtitles could properly translate the Japanese-dependent puns here. After Arisu and Sebastian head out, Aguri asks Mari what that was all about and Mari says she has no idea. Inside the house, Aguri is annoyed that everyone’s acting strangely and avoiding her. She unpacks her groceries, and as a nice callback to episode 42, we see that Aguri bought some carrots. Now that I think about it, it’s strange that a ten-year-old is being sent out to go shopping all by herself. Maybe things are different in Japan. But in America, if a ten-year-old was shopping by herself, she’d immediately be asked where her parents are and if she’s lost. Anyway, even though Aguri just did shopping for dinner tonight, Mari says that they’re going to be eating out at the Piggy’s Tail at 6 P.M. Aguri’s suspicious, so she arrives early and sneaks around trying to find out what the others are planning. To her surprise, when she looks through the window, she sees that her friends are setting up a birthday party for her. Even Sharuru, Raquel, and Lance are joining in with their human forms! Also, it’s interesting to see that Makoto started the series completely inept at cooking and ended it being able to make a delicious birthday cake for Aguri. Aguri wonders why the girls kept the birthday party a secret from her. Apparently, she’s never heard of a surprise party before. Fortunately, Mari guesses she’d be out here and tells Aguri to be thankful, as even though her friends didn’t know when her birthday was, they still threw a party for her. Aguri starts to tear up. Mari then invites Aguri inside and tells her to act like she’s surprised. The party commences, and unlike her friends, who aren’t that great at acting, Aguri does a good job of acting surprised. Everyone celebrates with her as Aguri finally blows out her own birthday candles and gets to eat a birthday cake. But all is not well, as the victim of the week has strolled on-screen. He’s upset that after he came all this way to the Piggy’s Tail, it’s reserved for a birthday party. Regina turns the guy’s Psyche into an ant Jikochu, which is pretty clever, as ants have a tendency to come after sweets. When the Jikochuu breaks into the restaurant, Mana’s parents and grandpa get turned to stone by its lasers when they try to protect the girls. Regina then comes in. She tries to compare herself to the evil witch in “Sleeping Beauty” who got revenge after not being invited to a party, but Rikka has to remind her what the fairy tale is called. Then, as Aguri leads Mari to safety, the other four girls transform. Only the beginning of the transformation sequence is shown, but there’s still enough time for Cure Heart to do her catchphrase. So far, the fight scene isn’t all that great. We get a little bit of interesting action (Heart kicking the Jikochuu, Regina swiping at Heart with the Miracle Dragon Glaive), but it’s so slowly animated that it’s quite lackluster. Outside of the restaurant, we see that Aguri is hardly even trying to keep Pretty Cure a secret from Mari anymore. She outright tells Mari that she’s going to get rid of the Jikochuu with Mana and the others and insists on going back inside. Surprisingly, Mari is perfectly fine with letting her ten-year-old (well, eleven-year-old now) granddaughter run into a battle zone. She just hugs her and tells her not to push herself too hard. Then, Mari walks off and Ai flies to Aguri, allowing Aguri to transform into Cure Ace. We don’t get Ace’s self-introduction just yet, though. Instead, right after transforming, she kicks the Jikochuu through a wall. Only after Ace makes her dramatic entrance does she say her usual, “The trump card of love! Cure Ace!” She even does her catchphrase afterwards! Regina sees Aguri’s birthday cake on the ground and angrily stabs it. Then, Regina and Ace take the fight outside. Regina is jealous of Ace because she gets to have her birthday party with everyone. She tells her that the party is pointless and tells her to disappear. Regina tries to kick Ace, but before Ace can dodge, Heart comes in and blocks the kick. Heart says that the birth of a new life is a miracle that should be celebrated. This is all it takes for Regina’s heart to clench up again. Since she hates this pain in her chest, she tries to fire a beam at Heart. Fortunately, Ace shoves Heart aside and prepares for a counterattack. Ira finally makes his presence known and butts in, but Diamond quickly stops him with Diamond Swirkle. Then, the whole team uses Royal Lovely Straight Flush to finish off the Jikochuu. With that, everything returns to normal. This whole fight was pretty disappointing. Not because of the animation, though that was pretty lackluster, too, but because Ace hardly did anything. Last episode, Rosetta played a major role in getting through to Regina. The episode before that, Sword did the same. You’d think in Ace’s episode, she’d also do something major. But nope; Heart steals her thunder. When Regina belittles Ace for her birthday party, she doesn’t defend herself. It’s Heart who comes in and does the talking, ultimately stealing the spotlight that’s rightfully Ace’s. Hopefully, next episode will treat Heart better. Also, Ira was an afterthought. It was kind of cute seeing him soaked by Diamond Swirkle, but he still felt shoehorned in, especially with his reformation arc still completely untouched. It turns out that during the fight, Mari called the police. However, to her puzzlement, when she brings a policeman over to the restaurant, the building is completely untouched. Mari asks Aguri where the monster went, and Aguri and Mana say that Pretty Cure took care of it. Before Mari can ask more questions, Aguri invites her back in to continue the party. And with that, the episode ends. Overall: It’s nice seeing Aguri in the spotlight again. Disregarding her supplanting Regina for so long and her behavior back in episode 23->16, Aguri really is a cute character. She tries to be mature, but she’s ultimately a little kid at heart. It’s really nice seeing her interact with her grandma again. Mari’s a cool character, as she’s mature and perceptive and always seems to know what to do to help her granddaughter. I’m also glad that (in the sub, at least) we finally got to find out that Aguri is adopted. It was also really cool seeing Makoto’s past. We now know that she was Cure Sword probably ever since she was born. It’s a shame that this tidbit of information isn’t in the dub. That being said, this episode was clearly filler. Unlike episodes 40 and 41, there wasn’t any progression on the Regina arc at all. Ace didn’t even get to do anything meaningful with her. Still, since next episode focuses on Aguri as well, we might finally get to see Ace actively participate in the Regina arc. Next time: Aguri/Natalie’s grandmother finds out that she’s Cure/Glitter Ace! Category:Blog posts